In a telephone interview from
Mexico City, an executive at the firm that owns the plane, Christian E. Esquino Nunez, said that the
Learjet 25 was perfectly maintained. Esquino, 50, said he believes that the
78-year-old pilot suffered a heart attack or was incapacitated in some other way, and
that a “green” co-pilot was unable to save the plane.

“We’re all grieving,” said
Esquino, who described himself as the operations manager of the company that
owned the Learjet 25, Starwood Management LLC of Las Vegas. “I’m definitely
very sorry that this happened.”
Esquino said
maintenance and safety issues “had nothing to do with the accident.” He said the
1969 Learjet had been based and maintained in Houston for the last 10 years,
and underwent a top-to-bottom inspection this summer.

The same plane, according to U.S.
aviation records, sustained “substantial” damage in 2005 when a fuel imbalance
left one wing tip weighing as much as 300 pounds more than the other. The
unnamed pilot, despite having logged more than 7,000 hours in the air, lost
control while landing in Amarillo, Texas, and struck a runway distance marker.
No one was injured.

Esquino called that accident
“minor” and said the plane had flown without issue for 1,000 hours since then.
He said the only conceivable explanation for the crash is that 78-year-old
pilot Miguel Perez Soto was incapacitated. He said that while the Learjet was a
fine airplane, “it has some critical characteristics.”

“Once it gets out of normal
flight mode … it’s hard to recover,” said Esquino, himself a pilot for many
years.

Mexican authorities said Starwood Management officials told them that Rivera was
interested in buying the plane, and as a result, hadn’t paid to rent it.

Mexican authorities and the National Transportation Safety Board were continuing to investigate the crash “to
formulate a hypothesis as to the cause of the accident,” the statement said,
noting that the investigation could take nine months to a year.

The remains of the passengers that have been found thus far, including
Rivera’s, have been taken to the University Hospital in Monterrey, where they will be analyzed by forensic experts, the statement said.